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ESRB Now Enforcing Game Trailer Ratings

Posted by Zonk on Mon Jun 25, 2007 04:34 PM
from the would-you-please-stop-thinking-about-the-children dept.
Government Entertainment Games Politics
Gamasutra has the news that the ESRB is beginning to enforce rating-related audience restrictions on game trailers. D3 Publisher's trailer for Dark Sector was judged AO by the ESRB, and demanded in correspondence to the company that it be removed from the internet. Take-Two, meanwhile, has been handed a letter saying their trailer for The Darkness needs to be 'age-gated' if it is to be seen online. Update: 06/26 14:20 GMT by Z : The Gamasutra post has been updated to clarify the situation: "ESRB president Patricia Vance has responded to Gamasutra with a prepared statement that claims today's notices are routine ESRB Advertising Review Council procedure followed since 2005. According to Vance, the appearance of both publisher emails today are simply reminders that mature rated trailers must be age-gated, and that if a trailer's content is found to be in violation of the ESRB's trailer requirements, it must be removed or replaced with an edited version."
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[+] The ESRB, Earmarks, and Manhunt 2 in Game Politics 48 comments
GamePolitics has a number of interesting posts up this week on developing stories. The ESRB has fired off a warning to 3D Realms over some out-of-date labeling on the Duke Nukem portion of their website. The organization says it's standard procedure, but 3D Realms co-founder Scott Miller views it as a 'sucker punch'. Meanwhile, Senators discussing earmarks for the year are in a row over videogames. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) is resisting a $7.5 Million appropriation for an advanced computer system, which he 'compared ... to videogames.' Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) countered by noting that Coburn authorized spending that resulted in the creation of an actual videogame, the Full Spectrum Warrior title released by THQ. Finally, Rockstar has fired back at GamesIndustry.biz. The respected European news site wrote a blistering editorial when the Manhunt 2 kerfuffle first started, saying that Rockstar was being 'juvenile, shameful, and irresponsible'. They've now responded: "What about games make them deserve special treatment from the authorities? According to industry groups, the average games player is in his or her 30s, yet you support the widely held view that games are somehow a less sophisticated medium than cinema, only suitable for immature audiences. In other words, although gamers can negotiate the boundaries between reality and fiction in other media, you believe we are incapable of navigating the same boundaries in videogames ... We believe in a well-run ratings system. With the best rating system in history and the future of the industry and medium at stake, we don't understand why it is necessary to effectively ban all games intended for players 18 and older."
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ESRB Now Enforcing Game Trailer Ratings 50 Comments More /

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  • Here is a link to said game trailer: link [gametrailers.com].
    No nudity, no blood spilled, one possible death. I feel so robbed...
    • Somehow I doubt that this is the trailer they are refering to. This trailer, according to the website, is over 2 years old
        • That is a very old trailer before a ground-up remake of the game. The old version was very tech and clean - the new version is much grittier and violent.

          It's a shame they decided to go a different direction with the game. The older trailer looked more interesting.
        • D3 should be thanking the ESRB, you can't buy publicity like this. I've never heard of this game before this article. However, after viewing the trailer it doesn't look all that good.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Walpurgiss (723989)
      The trailer they are trying to get canned is http://www.gametrailers.com/player/17392.html [gametrailers.com]
      Its named a gameplay montage rather than a trailer. It shows several methods of killing, from neck breaks, decaps, shooting, and cutting with a weird 3 bladed weapon that apparently can also catch fire and build up a lot of static.

      I can see their objection to it being used as a trailer, but as far as being game content isn't all that much more graphic than a lot of other games.
      • Wow, nice to see the ESRB really on the ball here. That trailer came out in March. Good work protecting the childrens from the evils of the intraweb trailers there....
    • From your link. then "veggie abuse" trailer is "age gated"

      It wanted me to download a suspicious plugin to view it though, something about MS windows media player 11, I closed the tab right around there.
  • Anyone have the link for the trailer that got rated AO? I could not find anything in the article and the trailers on youtube all seem pretty tame.
      • That qualifies as AO now? I'm not saying it's a bright and happy video with koala bears dancing in a flower patch but... seriously? Everything I saw in there was pretty tame in my opinion, and well in line with other games rated M.

  • This feels weird to me. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Perseid (660451) on Monday June 25 2007, @04:57PM (#19641675)
    Gamespot is not run by the ESRB. They have trailers online. Are they saying that the publisher must tell these gaming sites to remove all traces of their trailer? What if Gamespot says 'bite me'? Perhaps they can't. But what about uploads to YouTube? What about copies posted on Bob's Gaming? These trailers are meant to spread like crazy - they're commercials after all. One would think that the ESRB should tell the publishers their fate before their trailers get in the wild, 'cause I've never heard of Dark Sector but you better believe I'm hunting down the trailer as soon as I hit Submit.

    • Gamespot is not run by the ESRB. They have trailers online. Are they saying that the publisher must tell these gaming sites to remove all traces of their trailer? What if Gamespot says 'bite me'?
      In theory the publisher goes after Gamespot for infringing their copyright... But yea, once a video hits the internet, there's no holding it back.

      And the Dark Sector trailer is definitely gory
    • as long as they take these nasty, degrading, and utterly un-christian trailers off-line, i'll be happy. i can't count the number of times my search for interspecies erotica was interrupted by some obnoxious, violent popup displaying a trailer for some degenerate videogame. the intarwebs are safe at last!

  • Remove them from the internet, eh? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jasonmicron (807603) on Monday June 25 2007, @05:02PM (#19641747)
    How does one remove something already released to the internet?

    Besides, all they need to do is leak their trailers into some IRC & Newsgroup channels. Underground publicity is the best publicity, plus it is has plausible deniability.

  • Not the point of ratings. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MeanderingMind (884641) * on Monday June 25 2007, @05:18PM (#19642045) Homepage Journal
    I have no problem with games being rated AO, and I have no problems with trailers being rated AO. However, given the way in which the AO rating is practically being applied (and quite explicitly here) I believe it needs a new name: NFA (Not for ANYONE).

    What bothers me about this is that decisions are being made for us concerning what we can do and watch. It is not the place of the ESRB to say what can and cannot be on the internet. The power of the ESRB is entirely within its ratings and should be extended no further. Don't like a trailer for "Gorefest Maimkiller", slap it with AO. Congratulations, your job is finished.

    I don't like that Nintendo and Sony won't allow production of AO games, but at the very least they have the right to do so. Their consoles, their rules. The internet, however, is not owned by the ESRB. There is no government sanction (nor should there be) that gives them the right to tell us what can and can't be there.

    I never intended on buying Manhunt 2, and I didn't care or know about the titles in the article. I'm about 100x more likely to take interest in these if only for the fact that they're the ridiculous targets of needless censorship.
    • I don't like that Nintendo and Sony won't allow production of AO games, but at the very least they have the right to do so. Their consoles, their rules.

      Last time I check it was *my* console. I didn't pay a huge chunk of change for them to tell me what I can and cannot play.
      • Well then you should purchase a console from a vendor who allows you to do what you want with the hardware. Until then, I don't see you (or I, for that matter), having much choice.

      • Last time I check it was *my* console. I didn't pay a huge chunk of change for them to tell me what I can and cannot play.

        The NES hit the American market in 1985. The PlayStation in 1996.

        If it hasn't dawned on you by now that AO content was never part of the deal, it never will. It may - someday - dawn on you that ultra-violence and graphic sex is an adolescent obsession and not an adult's.

        The older the gaming market becomes, the more games like Manhunt 2 will be pushed into the margins.

        Too much grief,

        • What do the release dates for the NES vs. Playstation have to do with anything? Both have always had a strict policy of "No porn or AO games!". Granted, Nintendo was MUCH more strict with the NES and the SNES - garnering their reputation for being a Kiddie Console that still sticks with them today despite their efforts to show otherwise. Sony didn't have such a reputation, so it was easier to accept the Playstation as a platform aimmed at older, adults gamers. Even then, its games never got the controve
          • So, there's clearly a legitimate market for "AO" games - and not just ones filled with over-the-top violence and sex.

            Name one - just one - created for the unrestricted PC market.

            Unfortunately, the ESRB linked their "AO" rating to porn - causing most retailers to vow never to carry those titles due to all the social and legal issues with carrying pornographic items.

            The catch phrase for films like "Saw" and "Hostel" is "torture porn." It caught hold so quickly that I think it is fair to say that there i

            • ### Name one - just one - created for the unrestricted PC market.

              Fahrenheit: Indigo Prophecy Director's Cut available via online distribution in the US, rated AO.
              Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, even so removed from the shelves and rereleased later with M rating.

              The issue with AO is that you can't sell it, its nice that you are allowed to sell it on PC in the first place as opposed to consoles, but you still won't get into the shelfs at the big retailers, which means you can basically forget to sell any decen
        • It may - someday - dawn on you that ultra-violence and graphic sex is an adolescent obsession and not an adult's.

          Tell that to the porno industry. That's one of the stupidest statements I've heard in months.

        • It may - someday - dawn on you that ultra-violence and graphic sex is an adolescent obsession and not an adult's.

          I guess that means I'm still young at heart :).

          Seriously, thought, reality seems to disagree with you; just look at how most mythologies and stories, both ancient and modern, are about who kills and sleeps with whom.

          • Seriously, thought, reality seems to disagree with you; just look at how most mythologies and stories, both ancient and modern, are about who kills and sleeps with whom.

            Consider the qualifiers in the parent's post. "Graphic" sex isn't the same as "sex." There are plenty of stories of randy gods seducing women, but they are not graphic, in the sense that today's pornography is.

            Similarly, I don't think the parent poster was saying that adults don't view pornography, just that they're not obsessed with it-

    • I never intended on buying Manhunt 2, and I didn't care or know about the titles in the article. I'm about 100x more likely to take interest in these if only for the fact that they're the ridiculous targets of needless censorship.

      Does - anyone - here find it surprising that it was a Take-Two trailer that got the AO rating?

      If you can answer that question - truthfully - with a "Yes," congratulations. There is a place for you at Rockstar. For how long is another question.

      The Internet isn't owned by the ESR

      • Remember Snakes On A Plane? Cost $32 million to produce. Grossed $62 million world-wide. The Geek got the movie produced. But the Geek couldn't deliver the audience to make it profitable.

        Based on these figures it produced $30 million dollar profit and about 100% return on investment. Seems pretty profitable to me, but then again, I'm not a movie producer.

        • It's typical to allot roughly twice a movie's production budget on marketing and distribution (even setting aside "funny" Hollywood accounting). Similarly, the gross income of a movie is split with exhibitors. So with that rough rule of thumb, the production budget was $32M, marketing and distribution another $32M, for a total cost of $64M, and the studio saw $31M in their cut of the gross income.

          Total, fresh from my ass back-of-the-napkin figures, but yes, the general idea is that Snakes on a Plane didn'

  • Someone almost left Adult Only material on the internet!

  • ESRB a censorship organization? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by cgenman (325138) on Monday June 25 2007, @06:51PM (#19643169) Homepage
    This REALLY damages confidence in the ESRB. They're rating... trailers? Not only that, they're rating trailers and demand that they "are not to be available for download or viewing, regardless of being placed behind an age gate."

    This is really damaging news. If the ESRB is calling for the banning of what they would rate as AO material, then clearly there is a demonstratable censorial intent.

    "However, the mere presence of an age gate does not permit a publisher to simply put whatever content it wishes into the trailer. All trailers must still conform to ARC's Principles and Guidelines, which prohibit the display of excessively violent content or any content likely to cause serious offense to the average consumer."

    http://www.esrb.org/ratings/principles_guidlines.j sp [esrb.org]

    As a person who makes his living making video games, I find this disturbing. You can't both say that an Adults Only rating isn't censorship, then turn around and censor trailers you don't like... or in this case, contain AO material.

    Every time I've interacted with the ESRB is has been pretty benign, though publisher overreaction to potential ESRB issues is a problem. Also, hard and fast rules from the ESRB about content restrictions are basically nill, leaving creators floundering as to, for example, if flipping the bird is T or M. This is a position I may need to reconsider if active censorship is a part of their organization.

    'Come on ESRB... now's the time to restore the faith. Prove to us that information is at the top of your list by crusading FOR the sale of AO and unrated materials in the US.
    • As a person who makes his living making video games, I find this disturbing. You can't both say that an Adults Only rating isn't censorship, then turn around and censor trailers you don't like... or in this case, contain AO material.

      The film and television producer lives with this all the time. Trailers that will reach a general audience are rated for a general audience.

      "Freedom of speech" does not mean that you get to post suggestive billboards for your torture porn flick across from every schoolyard. Y

      • The Internet is not equivalent to other communications media. This is, in part, what makes it such a great place to have true freedom of expression - exactly why speech is so often vehemently protected on the Internet as opposed to other places, like a billboard. The fact is, messages and images posted on the Internet are much less likely to be unintentionally viewed; you generally have to go looking for the offending content making most complaints, in my opinion, irrelevant and serving an ulterior motive

        • I'm not sure you can make a blanket statement like that. Consider the subject at hand: video game marketing material. Doesn't it seem pretty likely that kids will want to consume any and all video game related material they can?

          Personally I suspect the ESRB's demand to take down an AO-rated trailer has something to do with pre-existing agreements between the company, relating to its membership in ESRB, I don't really know of course, just guessing the situation is a little more complicated than might be su

      • "Freedom of speech" does not mean that you get to post suggestive billboards for your torture porn flick across from every schoolyard.

        Why not ? Having to suffer through official sex education cartoons was pretty torturous, so if the combination is unhealthy, I'd say that the damage is already done :).

    • What I find really silly about this whole thing, is that the new Rambo movie's trailer is more violent than this montage of Dark Sector gameplay footage. Seriously, he rips dudes throats out, shoots them with explosive arrows, shoots at point blank with an M42, snaps necks, cuts heads off.. It's much more brutal and realistic than any of the over-normal-mapped graphics in that trailer/footage.
  • I supported the ESRB for taking a stand and rating Manhunt 2 AO, and I've defended them on this and other issues here. But this? Is nuts. The point of a rating system is to rate, not ban. Even demanding age gates is a little excessive, because every 13 year old knows how to subtract 5 years from his/her birthdate, and how do they make all the other sites that host trailers?

    Nice way to make "taking a stand" look like "just being assholes". Are they still mad at Rockstar for making them look bad with

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Taevin (850923) *
      I hate to be picky but anyone who was upset by the Hot Coffee "scandal" made themselves look bad, not Rockstar. Last I checked, no one has reason to be angry at the construction company that creates a building because they provided a surface for graffiti.
      • Well, yeah. The Hot Coffee stuff was pretty stupid. But a lot of people were upset by it, and it put the ESRB in an awkward position when people (who didn't have a clue about anything) started asking how they could have let that slip by. Personally, I think they should have just said fuck it, we wouldn't have rated Hot Coffee AO even if we had seen it, but they've taken enough of a beating in the media. Maybe they're still mad at Rockstar for putting them in that position, or maybe they're just overzeal
      • Not a real good analogy, since in this case the 'graffiti' was produced by the 'construction company', and then painted over. All someone had to know was that it was there, and how to make it show.

        This really -was- at least partially Rockstar's fault, as they could have removed the code and 'art' necessary to make the scene, and there would have been no scandal. (Art in this case being the script for the scene, as well as any scene-specific textures and meshes, if any.) The deal with the ESRB is that the
      • Ehhhh, it's more like a construction company that graffiti'd a wall, then painted over it, and someone else came along and took the coverup paint off.

        • I think it's more like a subcontractor of the construction company, under indirect ownership of a Chilean subsidiary, put graffitti on the walls, and then, egged on by junior-level employees (but not the permanent officers of the general contractor) made it more and more explicit. Then a third guy--Steve--came by and said, "hey, that's pretty funny, but it'll have to come out before the Japanese investors"--did I mention the Japanese investors?--"come over tomorrow." But the subcontractor thought it was so

  • What enforcement powers do these clowns really have? I would presume none and this is just saber rattling.

    But if they do have some enforcement power to go along with their ratings - that makes them censors. If that enforcement power exists, it'd be worth taking a good close look at where they got it from.

    • ### What enforcement powers do these clowns really have?

      They can give a game an AO rating or deny the rating completly, which results in the game being unpublishable on all consoles as well as being unsellable in many retail stores. So in effect the game would be banned with only online sales on PC being the last way out.

      ### that makes them censors

      Thats basically what they have become. Its not really their fault, but instead the fault of Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony, Walmart and friends due to not allowing AO

  • Troubling. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MaWeiTao (908546) on Monday June 25 2007, @10:54PM (#19645293)
    This is all very troubling because it represents current trends in government and society. This enforcement in and of itself might not be a big deal. But it represents the warning signs of a nanny state where we wont be able to do anything deemed harmful to our well-being. Kind of like that Stallone movie Demolition Man.

    The funny thing is that those enforcing these ratings apparently seem to be completely oblivious as to what is readily available elsewhere on the internet.
  • I don't go to the cinema much, but I seem to remember a brief certification logo displayed before trailers. Sometimes, in fact, it'll say that the trailer is rated 15 (say), while the film itself is 18, so that the trailer can be shown before the following (15-rated, in this example) film.

    How is this different? Both are short tasters of the real thing, both real things are themselves rated; it makes sense to me that trailers should also be rated.

    "Stop thinking of the children" and "this is the intarwenets a
    • the problem isnt that the trailers are being rated, its that the esrb is demanding the video be removed from the internet because they say so

    • Re:Suppose it's not a surprise, but... (Score:5, Informative)

      by xero314 (722674) on Monday June 25 2007, @05:06PM (#19641811)

      If a game is rated T, could a trailer by rated M?
      Yes, if the trailer contained content which is not in the actual game. This happens in game trailers. For instance it could be possible to make a Wii sports game trailer which showed people playing the game, while naked. This would change the rating of the trailer. Game trailers need not be made up of just snippets from the game itself. Many game trailers have had content only available in pre production demos (as happens in movies as well).

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by vix86 (592763)
      Its my understanding that games can't be published unless they have an ESRB rating. This isn't a law but its a general rule that many of the console makers follow. The ESRB can easily tell the company that they need to rate/remove the video or they won't have their games rated, effectively locking them out of having their games published. So its a form of coercion I believe.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by sanosuke001 (640243)
      ya, pretty sure the ESRB rating system is voluntary and no company has to get their game rated. Though not sure if Sony/MS/Nintendo require it to make a game for their system. If not, then the way things are going, companies are going to start putting their own ratings on their games, or no rating at all. The ESRB is going way too far, lately. That trailer posted in the first comment was lame. No wonder why there's been talk about replacing the ESRB...

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by aichpvee (631243)
      That's where it'll ask you your age before letting you see something. There's some gaming site that has this on their flash videos. I just put in January 1 (default date) and then whichever year I happen to click on first, usually somewhere in the 60s or 70s. It's stupid, because there's NO verification (I don't think there should be anyway, don't let your kids on the Internet if you don't want them to see stuff) and it's just annoying as fuck.

      Never heard the term "age-gating" before though, but it makes
      • That makes a lot of sense, actually. I'm not an appologizer for Rockstar or anything, but I'm not an appologizer for the ESRB either. A game trailor should be rated NO DIFFERENTLY than a realistic animated movie. And if you think animation doesn't have an effect on ratings, think again... animated violence is given a lower rating than actual film. Now, seeing that the difference between photorealistic graphics (especially FMVs) and film is becoming pretty pretty small (especially seeing as how large parts o

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by p0tat03 (985078)

      IMHO the problem is not that the ESRB is rating trailers, it's that it's going against the nature of the AO rating. AO means Adults Only, which means, like the name implies, that content from such a trailer or game should not be shown to underaged persons.

      In this case though, the ESRB is not calling for proper enforcement of age gates, or preventing the sale of the game to minors... no, they are outright banning the content! Doesn't AO mean "appropriate for people of age", instead of "not appropriate for

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